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pinkpastels113 · 4 years ago

Text

Talk Numbers To Me

Rating: G

Word Count: 3,326

Pairing: Chloe Beale/Beca Mitchell

Summary: In which Chloe gets help from her mathematical genius.

End B/C. One-Shot. Fluff. Tumblr prompt.

Read on ao3 or ff.net or below.

Prompt from anon; hope you all like.

Chloe shuffles her papers, kicking her feet in frustration at the numbers swirling in her head. Her hand flies to her hair, the pencil tangling in its strands.

“You okay there, Chloe?”

She looks up, sees Stacie blink questioningly at her from the microwave, and gives a tentative smile. “Yeah, just...” she sighs. “Homework.”

Stacie nods, retrieving her dinner burritos and closing the microwave door. “Do you need help?”

Chloe bites her lip and looks back down at the sheets of homework staring back at her from the kitchen table, its once clean blank lines now covered in blurry grey smudges. She doesn’t want to be of any inconvenience. “Nah, I’ll be okay. Thank you though, Stacie.”

“Are you sure?” Stacie grabs for a napkin before making her way over, “Because if it’s science, I can definitely help you out.”

Chloe carefully detangles her pencil from her pounding head, laying it back down onto the wooden surface. It’s not science, but something in Stacie’s tone of voice has her intrigued. “Oh?”

Stacie pulls out a chair, sits. She sets her styrofoam plate down onto an area not littered by mountains of paperwork and reaches for the one directly in front of Chloe. “Yup. I double major in Chemistry and Biomedical engineering. Which pretty much covers all the sciences that you could possibly take in your second senior year.”

Chloe raises her eyebrows, impressed. “Wow. I didn’t know that you double major, Stace. That’s amazing.”

Her fellow Bella just shrugs, eyes quickly scanning the page. “Eh, it’s alright. I love science anyways so it’s no big deal.” She then pauses, presumably figuring out that the subject of Chloe’s dilemma is most definitely not the one of which she is an expert in. “Oh, this is math.”

Chloe groans just at the mention of the word, tilting her head back to the fluorescent light of the kitchen ceiling. “Yeah, math. The worst form of torture in the entire world.”

Stacie just chuckles, shaking her head, “Only to people who don’t understand it.” She then stands, clutching Chloe’s topic of frustration between a thumb and forefinger. “I would love to help you out, Chloe, but I think someone else may be better at explaining this for you. She is a math genius after all.”

Chloe gets out of her chair as well, brows furrowing curiously as she trails behind the tall brunette, only then realizing that they are making their way to the living room, where the sounds of the tv can be heard, signalling the presence of the rest of the Bellas. “Someone else? Who else could be better at math than a Biomedical engineer?”

“Someone who actually studies it.”

And before Chloe could even ponder over which Bella would possibly want to subject themselves to the torture that is freaking mathematics, they have reached the entrance of the living room, and Stacie has called out the answer.

“Hey, Beca!”

What?

Chloe gapes, completely taken aback as she watches the unrequited love of her life look up from the screen of her phone at the mention of her name. “Yeah?”

Stacie waves the paper in her hand even as she continues to stalk forward. “Chloe needs your help with some math. I said that I would, but I just figured that a double math and physics major such as yourself would be a much better and viable option.”

Understandably, Chloe is not the only one in the room to have no previous knowledge of this news, or the only one to be completely shocked by it. Fat Amy turns away from the tv to quirk a disbelieving brow. “Double major? Shawshank? Math and Physics ?”

Chloe couldn’t help but agree. She knows that it’s wrong and impolite to underestimate a person’s abilities on what he or she could or not do, especially when said abilities are in academics—after all, they are all still in college—but Beca ? One of her best friends in the whole wide world, not to mention her secret crush/obsession/favorite person/love of her life and possibly all the lives she could possibly have hereafter—if she believes in that kind of stuff, which she kind of does, especially if it pertains to a possibility of her getting together with said love in one of those lives in the far future—with whom she had been pining for—especially at the times where it had been particularly difficult and tiresome—seemingly since the beginning of time? Beca, who would always tend to blow off school until the very last minute; Beca, who would rather spend time fiddling with her music in her room all by herself with just her and her headphones rather than indulge in books or people or anything not involving of her mixing board unless someone—usually Chloe—had to physically drag her away from the screen of her computer to go hang out? Beca?

Shouldn’t she have known everything there is to know about Beca in all these years—albeit technically that only includes two, but sometimes she really just feels like they have known each other since they were kids—that they’ve been friends? Teammates? Roommates? Family?

Beca rolls her eyes, stretching her arms in front of her chest to pull her body into a proper sitting position on the side of the couch. She locks and tosses aside her phone. “Yeah, I couldn’t decide which one to pick so I just decided to go for both. You guys didn’t know?”

Chloe finally finds it within herself to blurt out something that does not include her incredulity of the small brunette being capable of taking the most ruthless and tedious majors that there could possibly be in all the majors one could take at Barden University, “No, Beca, we didn’t.”

Jessica, Ashley, Flo, and Cynthia Rose collectively shake their heads in agreement.

Lilly just blinks, and Fat Amy’s lone brow stays exactly where it is.

Stacie snorts, Chloe��s paper dangling casually between two perfectly manicured nails against her side as she crosses her arms, shifting her weight onto one foot, “Figures. I suppose you all didn’t know that I am a double major too, did you?”

Six of the Bellas’ attention spotlight on the slightly indignant brunette, gasps and shouts of surprise and amazement instantly tossed into the air, Stacie’s explanation of the functionality of Biomedical Engineering immediately a follow up, but Chloe barely notices, because she is too busy having a silent exchange with her co-captain still situated on the couch.

She widens her eyes. Is this true? Are you being serious?

Beca nods, smirks. Hell yeah I am.

Chloe tilts her head, pouts. Why didn’t you tell me?

Beca shrugs. Didn’t find a reason to. She then rubs the back of her neck, looking suddenly sheepish and uncomfortable. And it’s not like it’s a big deal.

Chloe frowns, shakes her hands about. It is a big deal to me ! She then gestures between the pair of them. We’re friends, Becs, we are supposed to tell each other these kinds of things!

Beca tips her chin to the front of her chest, tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, and then peers at her shyly through her lashes. Sorry, Chlo.

Chloe’s heart melts, her feet immediately carrying her forward, and she lowers herself onto the couch cushions next to Beca, taking extensive care to not sit on her phone. She offers a soft and forgiving smile, before pulling her best friend swiftly into a hug. Don’t be sorry, Beca. She presses a kiss to her cheek. It’s okay.

Beca’s body relaxes, and somehow Chloe understands that the small brunette is relieved of the fact that Chloe is not mad or judgemental or flighty about how she is a double major in both math and physics. Chloe wonders if that is the reason why Beca hadn’t told her—that she had been afraid of her reaction—and if that is the reason why she had put on a brave face in front of the Bellas.

Beca always pretends like everything is fine and ineffective to her well being when she feels extremely self-conscious. She likes to put on a hard shell and proclaim the attitude of a “badass” to balm over her real emotions, to put on a show of I don’t care and whatever to mask over the I do care and I do feel.

Chloe gets the feeling that if it hadn’t been for Stacie—who’d most likely just stumbled across the discovery by accident—none of them would have known, until possibly graduation, when someone questioningly points out the lettering of her certificate, the duality of her degree.

Beca is bashful, self-conscious, secretive , of her abilities and status as a mathematical genius.

Chloe puts her lips to Beca’s ear. “Help me with my homework, please.”

She feels her best friend shiver, pull away, her beautiful stormy blues shy and reluctant as they flit across Chloe’s face, search between her eyes, and Chloe just sits and stays and waits until she says yes.

“Okay.”

Chloe beams, her arms unconsciously going around to surround Beca’s back for another embrace before she pulls away, and she stands up and makes her way over to Stacie, a bounce in her step as she taps the tall brunette—who’s now making fun of herself for being the “hot one” of the group—on the shoulder to get her attention, smiling gratefully when she turns and notices and hands her paper over.

“Thanks, Stace,” she says, winking to signal the double sentiment of her gratitude for both the help and the revelation of the information, grinning widely as Stacie comprehends and nods.

Hazel greens flash quickly and meaningfully to the slight brunette in the room, “Anytime.”

Chloe lets her return to her conversation with the rest of the Bellas, spinning around to purse her lips questioningly to ask Beca where it is that she wants to go.

My room.

Chloe leads the way, making a brisk detour to the kitchen to gather up her things, and she speeds up the stairs and skips down the hall, letting herself into the double bedded bedroom Beca currently shares with Amy.

“So why’d you choose math?” She decides between the bed and the desk chair, going for the bed.

Beca takes the chair. “I dunno,” she shrugs, “Just wanted to, I guess.”

Chloe sets the papers down onto the bedding, and makes herself comfortable. “You must really enjoy it for it to be a half of your double major, Becs.”

Beca gives a noncommittal hum, crossing her legs and wiping her hands onto the dark denim.

“And what about Physics? Any reason why you wanted to study that as well?”

“Oh,” Beca glances to her mixing board, “That’s just for sound engineering. It really makes it easier to find and test out the best places for a good mashup, and it’s really just useful for the recording and production of music.”

Chloe makes a small noise of understanding, following her line of sight briefly before going for the subject catalysing the shocking news of that evening. She picks up the first sheet of her homework, smoothing it out before offering it enthusiastically forwards, “So, math genius, you wanna let me know how it’s done?”

Beca grins, one hand caught between her thighs modestly as the other one reaches for the paper, “Sure, Beale. Good to know that you’re actually in need of my help for something.”

Chloe pushes back her hair, blinking at her in confusion, “What do you mean?”

Beca hides her face behind the frustrating sheet of paper, “Nothing. Just that you always seem to know exactly what you’re doing. Everybody always seems to go to you for help, never the other way around.”

Chloe’s heart flutters in her chest, and she has to push it down before it can go all swoony over the likely unintentional romantic admission. Later. “I don’t always seem to know exactly what I’m doing, Beca. I usually just wing it, and hope for the best.” At Beca’s disbelieving but playful scoff, she leans forward to bend over the top half of her paper, revealing Beca’s face, “And I’m here now, aren’t I? Math has always been a subject that I can absolutely not deal with.”

Beca rolls the tip of her tongue over the fronts of her teeth, “Only cuz nobody but nerds like me actually gets it. Still doesn’t establish the fact that you’re no less amazing and brilliant at everything else you do.”

If Beca had been Chloe’s girlfriend—if she had been dreaming that she is—Chloe would have lunged forward and kissed her senseless.

Settling for biting her lower lip anxiously to withhold the urge, Chloe gestures to the paper in her hands. “Well? Do you know how to do this?”

Beca looks like she’s just been snapped out of a daze. “Oh yeah, totally.” She spins around in her chair to reach for her bag, unzipping it and pulling out a tiny whiteboard from the utmost layer, as well as an Expo marker. “It’s kinda easy, actually. I can explain it.”

Chloe giggles at the materials in her hands as Beca turns back around. “Aw, that’s so cute!”

Beca glares, laying the whiteboard on one side of her lap and the paper in the other. “Shut up. It’s just convenient.”

Chloe mimes zipping and locking her lips and throwing away the key, but the smile on her face is irreplaceable.

Beca nudges open the cap of the Expo, letting it drop softly onto the floor at her feet as she rereads the question. “So, it says that this Marco dude needs to figure out where his stupid ball is gonna land if he throws it over the top of a building, so we have to make a graph.”

Chloe laughs, already comfortable with the familiar way Beca seems to make any situation less intimidating, “Do you talk to yourself like that when you do your own math?”

“Do you want my help or not?”

“Sorry, sorry,” Chloe lays a hand over her mouth in an attempt to stifle her amusement. “Carry on.”

Beca shakes her head, apparently having gotten very invested in her knowledge of math despite being self-conscious of it, “Jesus, Chlo. Anyways,” she brings the tip of the marker onto the whiteboard to draw two perpendicular lines, “Here’s the graph—” she draws a rectangle to represent the aforementioned building, along with a dot at the y-intercept, “—and here’s our dude.”

“Ooh, can we write down Marco,” Chloe interrupts, bouncing in her seat and pointing to the blank and boring dot.

Beca gives her a look, before sarcastically heeding her request. Five letters were squished against the side of the y-axis with an adorable arrow, “There. Happy?”

Chloe blows her a kiss, “Very.”

Beca sighs, dramatically, before continuing on, “So as I was saying, there’s Marco, and his ball is—” she scribbles down a number next to the side, “Thrown from this height, and we need to figure out—” she dashes a parabolic line towards the situational ground, “Where this —” she makes another dot, labelling it “splat”—much to Chloe’s delight— on the x-axis, “Is.”

Chloe nods vigorously, chin in her hands as she shifts closer to the edge of the bed, her butt just barely situated on the mattress now as she leans closer for a better look, “Yeah, totes.”

Beca doesn’t seem to notice her new proximity, on a roll now that she has gotten started, “And they have given you the formula so now, considering the fact that gravity is a thing and negative distances are not—” she copies down the formula and writes down what the variables represent for her right under, “You just have to plug all this shit in to get the answer.”

“Ohh,” Chloe says, getting it, but it falls on deaf ears as Beca seems to automatically plug in the figures for her, crossing out variables and scribbling down altercations as she goes along, and Chloe’s jaw drops, as seconds later, she has come to a conclusion.

Beca scribbles down “20 feet” and circles it victoriously, a small but satisfactory “Aha” escaping her lips as she holds the whiteboard up to the light. “There, I got it.”

A sudden wave of heat pools low in her belly, and Chloe gasps as she tries to make sense of the unexpected spike of arousal at the sight of the wide and unrestrained and confident grin painting across Beca’s lips, at the sight of the happiness and satisfaction sparkling within stormy blues, and at the sight of the pink and musically talented tongue clenched between Beca’s teeth, as if used as an anchor to her excitement of getting another math problem right.

Holy heck, Beca Mitchell is hot when she does math.

Chloe must have made a distracting sound, because Beca suddenly jolts, as if just then realizing that she is not alone, pink flushing into her cheeks as she lowers the whiteboard, her uncontainable grin fading into a sheepish smile, and she meekly hands the answer over.

“Sorry,” she says, fidgeting uncomfortably in her chair, eyes downcast to her feet as she watches them scuffle nervously against the floor, “I just got so excited. I don’t know what came over me, Chlo, I—” she visibly swallows, “I hadn’t meant to just finish your problem for you.”

Screw it. It doesn’t freaking matter that Beca is not her girlfriend.

Chloe pushes the whiteboard aside and grasps the arms of Beca’s chair, yanking it and the person in it towards her waiting mouth, and she kisses her best friend/secret crush/obsession/favorite person/love of her life/mathematical genius square on the lips with as much fervor—if not more—as the moment previous in which she had desired to dole out when Beca had inadvertently complimented her as an amazing and capable and kind individual in and of itself, and she groans, her feet spreading to accommodate the chair between her legs and her brain kicking into overdrive to accommodate the gasp fluttering into her mouth.

Beca freezes, her eyes still presumably wide open as Chloe nips against her lips, and Chloe is just about to pull away and chart the situation up to another uncontrollable heat of the moment when she feels the small brunette reciprocate, arms wrapping around her neck and lips pressing closer, and Chloe slides her hands down from the arms of the chair to tuck between the cushion of the seat and Beca’s thighs, lifting her up and into the air before prompting dumping her in her lap, and she giggles as Beca huffs at the ease of which she has completed the action.

“Show off,” Beca grumbles, her minty breath a mournful absence as she pulls her mouth away to kiss the angle of Chloe’s jaw, “This is exactly what I had meant.”

Chloe tilts her head to allow Beca more access, “Coming from the person who had just figured out the answer to my mathematical problem in just a number of seconds, I think you are being irrational, Beca.”

Beca laughs, her nose nuzzling into the side of her neck affectionately at the pun, and Chloe’s heart pounds, her fingers immediately going to scramble her papers off the bed and her body further onto it. “That literally calculates up to zero creativity, Chlo.”

“Whatever,” she says, adjusting herself amongst the blue sheets and rectangular pillows, “I’m not a mathematical nerd, unlike someone I know.”

“Mm,” Beca reconnects their lips, her fingers playing the ends of Chloe’s hair, “Speaking of, are we gonna finish your homework?”

“Later,” Chloe tugs at their clothes, her tongue darting out to trace the seam of Beca’s wide and unrestrained smile, “We can do it later. Right now I just want my hot and secretive mathematical genius to talk numbers to me.”

---

I rushed through this in the span of four hours (not nearly long enough for me to make grammatical and detailing errors) so I hope you all enjoyed it despite my laziness :P

Also, if you’re the anon who gave me this prompt, I hope I did you justice, and that I hope you liked it despite any intentions that you had initially had at the suggestion of this prompt (I know I did, but oh well, what’s done is done, and I’m honestly just happy that I am finished lol).

Let me know what you all think! :))

#bechloe #bechloe fanfic #bechloe fanfiction #bechloe oneshot #bechloe fluff #pitch perfect #pitch perfect fanfiction #beca x chloe #beca mitchell #chloe beale #mine #tumblr prompt #anon prompt #hope you all like #sorry for lack of grammatical edits #or details #I was rushing

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dhaaruni · 4 years ago

Note

Your belief in personal responsibility would be Republican if Republicans weren't the party of "let's cover up a coup" and "Why should I wear a face covering to prevent others from getting sick?" You do have a sense of calling yourself out for your past misdeeds, which I don't think Republicans do.

I don't know if it's Republican or not, but I do think that Democrats and liberals/leftists really do shy away from personality responsibility and it drives me insane. I'm not saying that people shouldn't have room to make mistakes but actually, there are consequences to the decisions we make and the actions we take, and we have to be cognizant of that.

Like, not everybody is equally good at everything and that's fine, not everybody has to be equally good at everything! However, people being better at certain things that are valued more in our society doesn't mean those things are worthless and morally inferior or whatever. I've seen this so much with humanities people online yelling that like everybody who's good at STEM is a war criminal that supports Raytheon or whatever and it's morally superior to be working at a literary agency making $37k a year, but actually, the reality is that a lot of STEM jobs are well-compensated because everybody who complains on social media about how much engineers are paid uses Twitter and Tumblr to complain!!! These jobs are paid well because their services are in high demand! And, I'm saying this as someone who is not great at coding but has worked very, very hard to be slightly better than mediocre at coding so I'm able to compete for jobs that pay more than $37k a year.

Also, even if people aren't naturally good at things, they can improve their skills through hard work and putting in the due diligence like your capabilities in academia or in sports or in art aren't immutable. For instance, I took a physics class in college and I struggle with physics a lot, so my boyfriend at the time would work with me on every single problem set and help me study for the prelims and final. But, despite all my effort, I still barely scraped a B- in the class after begging the professor to round my grade up while that boyfriend got an A+ in the class with very little effort because he's simply much, much better at physics than I'll ever be.

And, if I hadn't worked as hard as I did in that physics class, I flat out wouldn't have passed. I did every single homework assignment and was always at office hours, but I got a C on the first prelim, I got a D on the next prelim, and it's only because I busted my ass to get an A- on the final after doing practice problems for a week straight that I managed to get a B- in the class. It's not fair that I had to work so hard to get a B- while other people coasted and got A+s but that's just how the world works, and my choices were either to fail the class or do the work so I did the work. And besides, I managed to ace some other classes that people who are amazing at physics and computer science comparatively struggled with, so it kind of evened out.

And I honestly wish other people would have that same mentality instead of like, being salty that Tumblr user Dhaaruni doesn't think that effectively banning calculus in public schools is a good policy because it screws over kids that are good at math.

#answered #anonymous #mathematics #I guess lol #finance talk #kind of anyways

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reidingandwriting · 5 years ago

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“Peter? Shut up.”

Hiiii, everyone! I decided to post another short one-shot I’ve been writing, since the reaction to my last one was so nice 🥺 There’s a little spacing issue I couldn’t fix on my phone, I’m sorry!

Ship: Peter Parker x Reader

Warnings: Language

Word Count: 793

At the time, getting an apartment off-campus with your boyfriend Peter Parker seemed like a great idea. You two had been dating since junior year of high school, and now you were juniors in college. You both were at MIT, you studying computer science while Peter was studying mechanical engineering. After two years in the lovely (horrible) dorms, you decided to get an apartment together.

In the beginning, things were amazing. It was like a honeymoon stage. You both had similar schedules, so you were never alone in the apartment. You developed a routine and everything was going smoothly. However, you and Peter didn’t always sleep in the same bed. Peter insisted you snored too loudly for him to sleep, and you swore he didn’t know how to lay still for more than five minutes- so you each had your own bed for when you needed them. Until Peter’s room got flooded from a leak in the ceiling, thus revealing a multitude of problems in the apartment from the last tenants. The landlord said your apartment would need a couple of weeks to be taken care of, and moved you into a new apartment for the time being. The problem? It was a one bedroom. However, you and Peter insisted it would work, and you two were promptly moved into your new home.

It was now the first night in your temporary home, and you were brushing your teeth as Peter laid in bed.

“I swear to god, Y/N, if you snore, I’m kicking you off the bed.” Peter laughs as you glare at him, toothbrush still in your mouth. You silently flip him the bird before spitting and rinsing your mouth out.

“My snoring’s the problem? Please, Mr. I Have to Roll Over Every Minute. I can’t even snore because I can’t sleep with you moving around so much!” You turned the bathroom light off as you walked to the bed, getting in on the right side.

“I can’t even snore.” Peter mimicked you with a higher pitched voice, and you rolled your eyes.

“Mature, Parker. Real mature.” You laid your head back onto the plush pillow, and closed your eyes.

“You love me.” You hummed in response and Peter grinned in satisfaction. “Shark Tank or Impractical Jokers?”

“Either’s fine. I’m exhausted, I’ll be asleep soon.” You buried yourself in your blanket, smiling as Peter’s free hand found yours and squeezed it lightly. “Goodnight, Peter.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

——

Turns out, you were very wrong about sleeping soon. Between Peter’s tossing and the nerves about being in a new apartment, you couldn’t fall asleep.

“Psst. Y/N, are you awake?” Peter whispered, and you felt him roll over. You glanced over and saw him now facing you.

“Yeah.” You whispered back, turning to face him. “Can’t sleep either?” You gently ran your hand up and down his exposed chest, smiling as you felt him relax. Peter shook his head.

“Come ‘ere, cuddle me.” You happily obliged, burying your face in the crook of Peter’s neck, and Peter’s arm wrapped around your waist. And for a while, you enjoyed the peace and silence, starting to feel yourself fall asleep. “Y/N?” Damn it.

“Yes, Peter?” You yawned, trying to hide the annoyance in your voice from being woken up.

“Do you think Medusa has to feed her snakes?” Turns out, when Peter can’t sleep, he asks stupid questions. At first, you entertained him and his questions.

“Yeah, I’d think so. They’re magic, but they’re still snakes. They need food.” You thought it was a one time occurrence. Again, you were wrong.

The second night, he asked you another question.

“Y/N? What if rocks are really soft but tense up when you touch them.”

“Rocks aren’t alive, Peter. They can’t react to stimulus.”

And the cycle continued. Every. Night.

“Y/N? Is the ‘s’ or ‘c’ silent in scent?”

“Y/N? If you’re bald, what hair color do they put on your license?”

“Y/N? Which armrest at the theater is yours?”

“If you drop soap on the floor, is the soap dirty or is the floor clean?”

“How do you throw away a garbage can?”

“Why is this building called an apartment when they’re built together?”

“If only 2% is milk, what’s the other ninety-eight percent?”

After two weeks, you finally snapped.

“Y/N-“

“Peter? I mean this in the nicest way possible. Please, shut the FUCK up.” And he did. For a second.

“As I was saying, how do we really know today’s Thursday? We just have to trust whoever started keeping count never messed up.”

“PETER.” Needless to say, you enjoyed your private bedroom when you got back home. Only for a few days, because now you couldn’t sleep without your incredible boyfriend and his incredibly stupid questions.

#marvel #mcu #marvel imagines #mcu x reader #avengers #avengers x reader #peter parker x reader #spiderman x reader #marvel universe #neutral!reader #college!peter #college!reader #AU

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thinking-in-symbols · 4 years ago

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Quinquennial Life Assessment

So, it’s been a few years. When I was 19 I posted a sort of “roadmap” for the evolution of my life on this blog. Today I thought I’d revisit that. I want to take a look back and see what progress I’ve made, and then in a separate post I want to turn to the future, think about how my vision for it has changed, and consider how I can reincorporate these goals into that vision.

This is the list of things I wanted to get done in varying time frames. I’ve crossed off the things I’ve done to get a sense of my progress:

1 year:

At 19, my hopes were to accomplish the following things by age 20:

- Joined, and consistently participated in, at least 2 campus organizations that suit my interests, at least 1 of which should be competitive in nature - well, I joined the ISO and KVRX, my college radio station! Neither of those were competitive, but in retrospect I don’t really care about that :-)

- Made concrete plans to study abroad - Nope, unfortunately I never did this. I’m not quite sure I regret that, all things considered - I traded that experience for other things. I did make plans to spend a few months abroad of my own accord, and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for that meddling global pandemic. But as it stands I haven’t done this.

- Learned C++ and python to proficiency - Hm. “Proficient” is a relative term. But I think I have a tendency to downplay my skills, so in the interest of counteracting that I’m going to count myself as “proficient” in these languages. I think that’s fair.

- Gone on at least a several day road trip with at least 1 friend - I’ve gone on several trips with @meeshbug, my very lovely girlfriend and best friend in the world :-)

- Decided on a concentration beyond the extremely vague umbrella of “computer science” - Unfortunately as far as my education is concerned I never really did this. If anything my interests have *broadened* rather than becoming more focused. More on this later...

- Made meaningful, ongoing contributions to an open-source project - You know what? I’ve published the source of everything I’ve ever made, and I’ve gotten to the point where I can make stuff that’s not trivial. So I’m giving myself credit for this one.

- Learned to cook enough meals to eat in most days and not get sick of my own food - I wish. I’ve learned to cook a fair amount of stuff but I still get way too depressed and lethargic to apply that consistently. Whether I consider myself to have achieved this honestly depends on the month.

- Learned to keep my living area clean - I’m much better at this than I was at 19, but at 19 I could barely clear a path to walk across my room. So there’s more work to do. More on these last two later.

- Gotten a pet - Meesh and I have a dog named Courage (after the dog of cowardly fame) and a cat named Jax!

2 years:

- Independently written a piece of software to completion and deployed it publicly - I’ve always pretty bad at actually seeing projects through to completion, but I do have a few full, independent projects under my belt at this point. I’ve built a simple game engine, a pathtracer, plugins for games I like, and some other stuff.

- purchased and begun regularly using some basic amateur radio equipment - Ah man. I got my license but I still haven’t gotten any equipment. I guess I have to get on that...

- purchased and begun experimenting with some basic music recording equipment - This one I’ve done, but I haven’t done as much experimenting as I’d like.

- hosted a party - I did this for my 21st birthday and it’s one of my favorite memories! Honestly this was probably the last time I had all my really close friends in one place. I’m actually getting kind of emotional about that.

- done some kind of hallucinogen - I have now done this. I definitely did get something out of it, albeit not what I expected. This is something I actually only did pretty recently and it’s still having a pretty profound effect. Maybe I’ll write a separate post about this.

- Gone camping with friends - Despite my best efforts, this hasn’t happened yet. Pretty fucked up.

3 years:

- learned to play another instrument besides the piano (guitar?) - I don’t feel comfortable crossing this one off quite yet, but I went ahead and bought myself some guitar equipment and have been messing around with it lately :-) I think I’m going to have to bite the bullet and pay for lessons if I’m serious about this, which I am.

- Written and recorded a song - Damn, I can’t believe it’s been 5 years and I haven’t even done this.

- Met a group of people I can play music with - nope

- Owned a leather jacket. I can’t believe I’ve still never even owned a leather jacket - I’ve done this and wore it frankly too much. Kinda cringe.

- Worked as a professional software developer - Yep! Worked as a software developer for a retail company for a couple years. I’m actually not working as a software developer right now, though; I’m working in a sort of adjacent position. More on this later.

- Participated in research related to my field - That’s pretty ambitious. Not sure I’ll ever do this, unfortunately. But we’ll see.

- Been to a film festival - Oh shit, I totally forgot about having written this. That’s a cool idea. I should do this, it’s not like it’s hard (well, at least in principle. I guess covid kind of changes the situation).

- Gotten a dog - Courage is one of those, I think, although he might also be part rat.

- collected 50 records - Lol, my dumb ass really thought I was going to buy $1,000 worth of records on college money. No, I haven’t done this, but I’m on my way there.

- Purchased a desktop computer - Well, my dad gave me his old desktop. That’s not really a purchase but I think it counts.

5 years:

- Begun accepting freelance development gigs - haven’t gotten here yet and I’m not totally sure this is a direction I want to go in my career. Freelancing has its own stressors as I’ve come to learn from others. No career path is sunshine and roses and I’m trying to internalize this fact.

- Participated in a student film - Nope. I don’t even know why I wrote this down to be honest.

- Gotten laid by solving a 5x5 Rubik’s Cube in front of a girl because surely that’s gonna have to work on someone eventually, otherwise I wasted a lot of time - These are getting weird. Surely I didn’t really expect this to happen, right? Well, either way I now have a long-term girlfriend, so I don’t - wait, Meesh has seen me solve a Rubik’s cube and she saw it before we started dating. So actually I’m going to give myself credit for it. I’m the one who makes the rules here.

- Fleshed out my political opinions - Yes, I now know everything about politics and can answer 100% of questions on political issues. Just kidding. But I know where I stand.

- Participated in a protest or some other kind of political event - Done! Went to a few protests as part of the ISO, participated in lots of their events, and attended some protests with friends as well.

- Studied abroad - Nope :-/

- Learned a language other than Spanish - I took a semester of French! But I don’t quite want to give myself credit for this one because I really would like to learn a different language to something resembling fluency.

- Run a marathon - Lmao. I am in much worse shape now than I was when I wrote this post, and even at that time I could probably do like 7 miles if I really pushed myself. How sad.

- Gone hiking outside of texas - This is weird because I’d literally already done this when I wrote this post. But I’ve done it more since then, so hey!

- Been out of the country with a friend - This I had also already done. I guess the point is to have done it without “adult supervision” or whatever. I haven’t done this since writing this list so I guess I have to leave it uncrossed.

10 years:

- Lived with a girl for an extended period of time - Meesh 🥰

- Spent at least 6 months living on the road in an RV, preferably with a dog and a girl - God, I am so close to being able to do this. I don’t want it to be an RV anymore - those things are expensive. But a van? Still pricey, but doable, especially if I’m willing to sacrifice some comfort. This has actually been front-of-mind for a while. I’ll let you know when I get the balls to pull the trigger.

- Started making Real Money - Well, yep, I have gotten to that point. I do have other thoughts on this, though. Money is weird, man.

- Lived in a long-term living space outside of Texas (i.e. not including RV time) - How long is long-term? Three months? If so, I’ve done this by living in Boston with Meesh for a few months after she went there for law school. However, I anticipate staying there much longer in the near future, so I’ll wait on this crossing this one off.

- Written a book about something, idk - Not yet. I’m halfway to the deadline on this one and I have some ideas, but ideas aren’t worth all that much, especially to me, who rarely sees them through. We’ll see where this goes. It’s not exactly a priority and historically I struggle to get even my priorities done. It might make more sense to replace this with recording a concept or narrative album, for which I also have ideas that I happen to take more seriously.

- Learned to solve a 6x6 Rubik’s Cube - nope

- Gotten laid by solving a 6x6 Rubik’s Cube - nope

- Lived in an apartment where I pay all the rent - Yes! :-))) We love independence

- Earned an advanced degree (this one’s iffy) - This hasn’t happened, and whether it will ever happen is something I’ve been thinking a lot about. I sort of decided half-way through college that I would be totally burned out on school by the time I graduated. But in retrospect it takes way less time to burn out on work than it does to burn out on school, and grad degrees are a different kind of thing. So it’s worth revisiting.’

- Given a best man speech (Sam, this means you have to get married within the next 10 years. Good luck out there.) - Holy shit, Sam, you maniac, you actually did it! Sam got married back in 2019 and I gave his best man speech! It’s another one of my favorite memories :-)

- Gone on a cruise with someone I’m dating - Hmm, not yet. I’ve gone on cool trips, but none on a boat. Maybe that’s something to aim for after the pandemic passes :-)

Retrospective:

1yr: Completed: 5/9

More than half isn’t bad! I’m not gonna worry too much about whether I got these things done within their assigned “time-frame”. I’m a procrastinator in my heart and I don’t see any reason to put that kind of pressure on myself. The point is, they got done. That’s enough for me.

The things I did best in in this category were academic things, and things to do with relationships. I’m proud of the academic achievements, I really feel like doing them has increased my belief in myself and my sense that I’m good at the thing I’ve spent the last four years studying. And of course, I am so happy to be in a loving, fulfilling relationship that brings so many good things into my life. I almost feel like the things I accomplished sort of fell into my lap - of course I’m gonna do programming stuff as a programming student, and getting pets / going on road trips are things I did as a result of my relationship with Meesh. I don’t say that to downplay the accomplishments, but I do think it’s worth noting.

The things I haven’t done are more to do with personal development, which is disappointing. I would like to be able to say, 5 years down the road, that I’ve done the personal development I expected to do in just a single year, but maybe that’s a lot to expect. These are problems I’ve dealt with my whole life. I think what this means is that I can’t expect everything to fall into my lap. Those things are going to take real concerted effort to change. I’m not quite sure how to go about that, though.

2yrs: Completed: 4/6

Two-thirds! Even better!

Lots of these are one-time accomplishments, not so much long-term commitments to personal development. The good news is, I did them, and I think those resulted in some development in their own right :-)

Again, though, the things I didn’t do so well are the things that require long-term, concerted effort. For instance, while I crossed off the one about experimenting with music, it’s really only the initial investment that I’ve really done at this point. It remains to be seen whether I’ll be able to follow through on the commitment to actually experiment and learn.

3yrs: Completed: 4/10

This category also follows the same pattern I’ve noticed with the last two. The other thing I’m noticing is that so, so much of my effort over the past few years has been going towards developing a very particular skill: programming / computer science. Music and art are so important to me, but I’ve done very little real development in those areas. I mean, I’ve done some. But not as much as I would have hoped for half a decade.

5yrs: Completed: 4/10

This is getting a little more fun because less of my goals have to do explicitly with my degree. I’m starting to think beyond college, which is good, because the stage of life I’m in right now requires me to start thinking about the kind of life I want to build now that I’m done with school. Also, I’m at the deadline for this one right now! So this is a particularly interesting category because it really shows where I thought I’d be by this time.

The goals I accomplished in this timeframe are, again, mostly things I’ve done through my relationship, but politics also feature pretty prominently on this part of the list. I spent a lot of time reading and researching political issues during college and really did look for ways to participate. I honestly made politics a pretty big part of my identity over the last 5 years, and I think it will stay that way forever, but I’ve gotten to the point where I think I need to devote less of my mental energy to knowing more. I know what I need to know. It’s time to think about other things.

10yrs: Completed: 4/11 (and counting!)

There’s some career stuff in this section that I’ve been able to do, which is good news. I’ve always been scared about entering the working world. All things told, it’s gone more smoothly than it could have. But I also have lots of lingering doubts about what I want to do in the long term. So one of the most pressing goals I should aim for is to resolve those doubts.

Ultimately, I have a lot of time left, and I’m not even done with this time frame, so I’m not gonna spend much time dissecting the things I haven’t done. What I’ll do instead is say that while I didn’t do everything on this list, I feel proud of the things I have accomplished. I said when I first wrote this list that it’s sometimes hard for me to feel that my life is moving in any particular direction, and I’m still feeling like that five years later, to be honest. But looking back on these things has helped me see that I actually am making progress in my life. Not in all the ways I want to, but that’s OK. There’s still time.

In the next couple days I want to come back to this and reorganize this list into an updated set of goals, for the same time frames. Maybe that will help me think through exactly what it is I want out of the next five-ten years, with the benefit of having analyzed the things that I did and didn’t do well over the previous five.

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addierose444 · 4 years ago

Text

UMass Course Experience: Spring 2021

This semester, I took my two courses at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (just UMass from here on out). The specific courses were computer systems principles (COMPSCI 230) and introduction to the C programming language (COMPSCI 198C). You can check out my other spring 2021 courses here and read more about Five College course registration here. These courses together replace microprocessors and assembly language (CSC 231) which is the systems core course required for the computer science major. In some ways, this was the perfect semester to take a Five College course as I didn’t need to factor in travel time. However, I also didn’t get the full experience as the courses were remote and asynchronous. My initial motivation for taking a Five College course was to deal with some scheduling conflicts. These conflicts became a nonissue when I decided not to take French this semester. You can read more about my decision to not study abroad here. I took these specific courses because Smith’s equivalent course is only offered in the fall and given my interest in systems taking the core systems courses sooner rather than later made more sense than a random computer science elective.

My use of the past tense in reference to my UMass classes is actually appropriate as I have completed all of the coursework. In fact, I finished COMPSCI 198C before the Smith semester even started. I know that sounds sort of crazy, and it is, but it’s also not as crazy as may you think. Specifically, the UMass semester started two weeks before Smith’s and COMPSCI 198C was a one-credit self-paced course that opened up even earlier. That said, finishing the course in about a week and a half was no walk in the park and amounted to over a full-time job. (This was also on top of my French class and other work I was doing during interterm which you can read about here). While I had the entire semester to complete COMPSCI 198C, I wanted to finish it early so that I wouldn’t have to worry about it during the semester and so that I could feel fully prepared for the COMPSCI 230 for which it was a pre/corequisite. To be totally honest, for a one-credit course, COMPSCI 198C was a difficult and time-intensive course. I’m glad that I managed to finish the course before the Smith semester because it would have been too easy to put off the work given the lack of hard deadlines. On the other hand, if I hadn’t worked through the class so intensively I don’t think it would have been nearly as time-consuming. Namely, I would have taken more breaks and been able to return to my code rested and with a fresh perspective. Furthermore, I would have been more likely to get help.

COMPSCI 198C was broken down into 12 modules and was pass/fail. (It did take the course seriously though because I actually wanted to learn the material). Each module had a specific topic and contained readings, pre-recorded lectures, a quiz, and a programming challenge. As for course content, we learned about data representation in C, pointers, dynamic memory allocation, structs, and more. Going into the course, I did have some background in C from Harvard’s CS50x. (You can read my full review of that course, here). The most fun component of the class was definitely the programming challenges. (It was also the most challenging and at times frustrating component, but that’s how you learn). The challenges were graded by computer (via an upload to Gradescope) which allowed for immediate feedback. The challenges included detailed documentation and some starter code.

COMPSCI 230 was also asynchronous but released material on a weekly basis (9:00 on Monday mornings). The one synchronous component was the weekly lab which for most students took place over Zoom. The weekly coursework consisted of readings, lecture videos, and short lesson quizzes. Fortunately, all of the readings for this course were provided free of charge as pdfs or websites. Because COMPSCI 230 is an introductory course, we didn’t go crazy in-depth into each topic. At the same time, we covered a lot of material and there were a ton of details to pay attention to. Part of the reason we were able to cover so much material is that it was mostly conceptual and thus we didn’t spend half of the class going through example problems like you would in a math or engineering class. As for course content, we learned about processes, threads, and basic computer architecture. We also learned about signals, pipes, and network communication.

We also had a one-hour weekly quiz that we could take any time between noon on Friday and the end of the day on Tuesday. While I did the other coursework during the week and usually took the quiz on Friday afternoon, you could technically do almost everything over the weekend. To read more about a typical week of my spring 2021 semester, click here. In addition to lecture material, we had a total of six projects (and associated project quizzes). These projects involved systems-level programming and were a lot of fun to work on. Like the COMPSCI 198C programming challenges, most of the projects had starter code and were graded by an autograder on Gradescope. The first project introduced us to debugging with gdb. Our last project had us write a client program that communicated with a server to solve math problems. Other projects included a bank simulator and a cache simulator.

While five credits worth of classes is far from representative of an entire university’s courses, it’s only fitting to try and compare them to what’s offered at Smith. This is also highly unscientific as my UMass courses were asynchronous and during a pandemic. (It is worth noting that the vast majority of UMass’s other spring courses were synchronous). The first main difference is shear course size. Specifically, COMPSCI 230 had 316 students and an entire course team. At Smith, our equivalent course (CSC 231) is capped at 30 students. (The largest class I have personally taken at Smith was game theory (ECO 125) which had 73 students). The COMPSCI 230 lectures were by the actual professor, but the lab sections and most asynchronous help were from teaching assistants. With this large class size and the asynchronous format, there was little chance to get to know my classmates and professor. (I did join a Discord with a few classmates, but that was fairly focused on course material rather than general socialization). There was also an official discussion board on Piazza to ask questions (to be answered by other students and/or the instructors). Communication with the instructors (the professor and the TAs) also took place on Piazza with private posts. In fact, the only time I ever emailed my professor was before the course to get the syllabus to submit to the registrar’s office. Despite not knowing us as individuals, my professor clearly cared about us as individuals and about our wellbeing. At Smith, it’s the norm for professors to genuinely care about their students and about teaching. From reading posts on Piazza, I got the clear impression that my peers didn’t feel the same level of support from their other professors. The course size also meant that most everything was graded by computer. The autograder for the projects allowed for partial credit, but the quizzes didn’t allow you to explain your answer. There were a few quizzes that had somewhat ambiguous questions that were dropped from the quiz. This got a bit annoying if you had gotten that question right, but had gotten some others wrong. In a smaller class, the question would probably be kept in and if a student raised an issue they may be able to argue points back just for themselves.

All in all, I had a positive experience taking COMPSCI 198C and COMPSCI 230 at UMass. With that said, I definitely wouldn’t want to have an entire schedule worth of 300 person asynchronous classes. Even though I didn’t have to take these courses this semester, it’s really nice going into my junior year having completed all of my computer science core classes. Furthermore, I should be well prepared for future systems classes including digital circuits (EGR 390dc) next fall which has either EGR 220 or CSC 231 as a prerequisite (and I will have both by the end of this semester).

#college #Smith College #UMass Amherst #five college consortium #spring 2021 #asynchronous #computer science

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nleeowens · 6 years ago

Text

How Fleabag Made Me Hopeful for the Future

Wrote this essay soon after binging Fleabag on Amazon Prime when the second season came out. It is such an amazing show, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge deserves all of the awards because she is brilliant.

I did everything that was expected from me. In high school, I was constantly on the A-B honor roll (even on the A honor roll a handful of times), studied hard for my AP and IB classes and graduated with an IB diploma and college credits. Straight from high school I went to college where I decided to major in computer engineering despite the fact that my previous experience with tech was limited to troubleshooting my video game console and making websites using wordpress with my friends. (Maybe it was to spite my teacher who said I would end up being an English major. Though she wasn’t entirely offbase.)

I would admit, I fell off the wagon at first. Had to retake a couple classes because I got a C. (Oh, the horror!) There was even a semester I considered to drop out of computer engineering and major in creative writing with a focus on screenwriting. But the fear of becoming a starving artist, disappointing my parents, and being passive-aggresively belittled by friends and extended family put me back on track. I reentered the College of Engineering as a computer science student.

This brief lapse of judgment put me back a semester, but I was still able to graduate in December four years later. And, without giving myself any break, I moved out of the university apartment I shared with three other people, rented a one bedroom apartment with a rent that’s way too high, and started my first full-time job.

I should be happy. I should feel fulfilled. I should be eager to spend the rest of my years working my nine to five job. Everyone has patted me on the back, told me I’m making good choices. So why do I still dread the future? I’ve only turned twenty-four almost half a year ago and I already feel as if I have somehow royally fucked up my life.

Somewhere along the way, I must have made an irreversible error. An error that will lead me to live the rest of my life in misery. Constantly promising myself I’d make some dramatic change, but never seeing it through. Until one day I slip in the shower and crack my head. (A reminder to myself to invest in bathtub mat.) It would be days until anybody finds my nude corpse because I am a terrible daughter, sister, and friend and I am known to go long periods of time not responding to anyone.

The other me that is not prone to dramatics recognizes that I have time to truly grow into myself. To fall in love, to travel, to find my passion. Because despite what teen dramas try to sell you, life does not peak in high school or even college. But, in times where depression and anxiety hits its hardest, it’s easy to ignore my rational self and believe in a future where my neighbors are going to have to call the police concerning a suspicious smell coming from my apartment.

So watching Fleabag felt like the reminder that my dramatic self needed. While I’m more similar to the titular character's older sister, Claire, (we are both a bit neurotic, and worry about our little sisters) I found myself relating to Fleabag more than I first thought I would. While I am far from being as quick-witted and weirdly charming as Fleabag, I can recognize the emotional struggles that she goes through as my own. We both feel cast aside by our emotionally neglectful fathers, and constantly grapple with feelings of inadequacy when compared to others. And like Fleabag, I lost my best friend who meant everything to me. Though a year has passed, a part of me is still in mourning and probably always will be. While Fleabag ignores her problems by sleeping around, I ignore my problems by just sleeping.

Though to be blunt, Fleabag is a walking talking disaster for most of the first season, and though we share some emotional baggage I have never cheated on anyone or stolen from my dad’s girlfriend (though I admit I have considered it). I even find some smug solace in knowing that I’m not that much of a hot mess.

By the end of the first season, Fleabag had reached her lowest point yet. She had been humiliated by her dad’s girlfriend, awkwardly ran into her ex, and ostracized by her family. She was alone, and had no one to talk to, almost walked into a busy street similar to how her friend died. It isn’t until a bank manager that she accidentally flashed at the start of the season comes by that she addresses her feelings of despair. And it’s the bank manager, someone who had no real relation to her, who tells her the simple indistuable fact that “people make mistakes”, and he gave her the opprutinity to get better.

Suprisingly enough, Fleabag takes that opprutinity. And even more suprising she does get better. She takes steps to take better care for herself, emotionally and physically, and is able to save her dying cafe. While she is not perfect in the second season (but who can be?) and is still trying to figure some things out, she astonishes her sister and the audience by being okay. Even when she gets rejected by her love interest, she is still okay.

Fleabag was in her early thirties when she hit rock bottom, the age where I assumed all adults have truly figured out how to be an emotionally balanced and fulfilled adult. As my own thirties inch closer and closer, I feared that I was going to miss the deadline. So watching Fleabag take the initiative to be better, even experiencing true love for the first time (as well as the heartbreak that comes with it), reminded me that I still have time to do the same. I have time to heal. I have time to grow. I have time to love and be loved.

#personal essays #fleabag #phoebe waller bridge #My writing #writing #writeblr #writers of tumblr

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same-side · 6 years ago

Note

I’m sorry if this is too personal but your bio says mechanical engineer and I just think that’s so freaking cool especially being so young and I was wondering what’s that like? (Please dont feel pressured to talk about this if it makes you uncomfortable!)

Hey there! No worries, I don’t mind talking about it)

this is pretty broad so i guess i’ll just ramble a bit. You’re welcome to ask me any more specific questions you might have! Thank you so much for checking in and just. being curious! c:

“young” omg

I suppose I am. Usually, here, engineering takes five years to get the B.S. because it’s such an intensive programme with so many classes to take. I overloaded myself with credit hours so I could get through school faster. I graduated about a year ago and honestly I do not miss school at all; the working world is so nice!! I was the kind of person that was in student government, several clubs, and interning all on top of classes, so when I got into the working world it was like… I finally had time to breathe and do things I enjoy (like art!).

I’m a mechanical engineer, but we’re a really versatile class of engineer. Our educational and professional scope covers everything from materials engineering to programming. A huge percentage of mechies are design engineers; you would probably assume given my art hobby that I’m a design engineer. Ironically, I don’t find much enjoyment in CAD (computer aided design, 3D) modeling and design work; I’m much more adept at taking a look at problems, analyzing them, and fixing them. In fact, all of the positions I’ve had have been in the testing realm.

I actually got my undergrad specialization in propulsion; that means I’m really heavily focused on understanding flowpaths and how fluids and heat interact with components. For example, studying and reducing drag on a car, making aircraft faster by controlling the airflow, making an engine more efficient with hotter combustion, or creating piping systems. I plan on getting my masters in fluid mechanics as well, though it will have to wait a few years.

I’m legally not allowed to discuss my current position, but I can tell you about some of what I used to do!

When I was in college I interned with NASA JPL on the Mars2020 rover team. I was then picked up full time on the Europa Lander team, where I worked for a full year before switching to my current employer.

For the rover teams I worked in testbeds. Simply put, testbed engineers break things. Usually what happens is you have a prototype - in my case, I worked in mobility systems so I was usually testing parts of the robotic arm for the 2020 rover. You look at the specifications and what that prototype is supposed to accomplish, you design different series of controlled tests to push it to its limits, find out where it succeeds, where it fails, etc., and then you design and build the accompanying machinery (testbed) necessary to do so. Oversee the tests, analyze the data, then redesign the components to better succeed at their intended purpose. I really like working in testing because it sees the full scope of engineering. I get to dabble in design work and programming and robotics and materials science and technical writing and hands on building. I get to do all of it, not just the same thing day in and day out. Oftentimes I worked on legacy hardware from the Curiosity Rover; so basically I would take component designs from Curiosity, redesign them, test them, then pass them along to that subcomponent team for review.

For the lander team, I worked cradle-to-grave on the lander’s drill mechanisms. I led a team of three other engineers and we designed, built, tested, and rebuilt the drill for the lander from scratch. It’s important to note here that this was the prototype, non-flight hardware. So what happens now is they’ll take our design and physical drill prototype, rework it a bit, and then very, very carefully make the one that will go on the real lander that gets shot into space. This is to avoid any kinds of contamination and to ensure precision machining of the parts.

My brother is also a mechie and I actually chose to be one because of him. My parents were always super supportive and proud of him, and I wanted that support, too. they. did not believe women should do math or science. So it was a constant struggle of my parents telling me to change my major to something more acceptable. It was also a struggle of oftentimes being the only woman in my classes, not having female professors, things of the sort. I used to do a lot of outreach with children, prospective students, families, corporations, charities, etc. to make sure other underrepresented individuals didn’t have to go through the same scorn I did, and knew how to combat it when they did face it. That’s probably. the only thing I really don’t like about being an engineer, but with each year it gets better.Anyway, I hope that gives a little insight into my life and what I do! Have some pictures!

#t talks #engineering #Anonymous #asks for ts

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irarelypostanything · 5 years ago

Conversation

Unnecessary Arguments - Lowell High School is using a lottery system

Person #1: Okay, before we begin this argument I want you to admit in front of everyone that you’re jealous you didn’t get into Lowell

Person #2: Wow, starting the debate with a personal attack. You should run for president

Person #1: You’re jealous you didn’t get into one of San Francisco’s two magnet high schools. That’s why you believe Lowell shouldn’t exist

Person #2: No, Lowell should definitely exist. And no, I’m not arguing against its placement process. What I want to argue is that at this particular point in time, many students are lacking in critical data points. The solution? A lottery. That’s exactly what they did

Person #1: Brilliant. Maybe they should do that at Harvard, too...get the names of everyone at the age of 18, run a random number generator, done. Hell, maybe Google and Amazon should do that to hire their next set of software engineers. I’ve heard software engineer managers tend to disproportionately hire people with computer science degrees

Person #2: We’re putting middle school students, who know very little about anything, through an insanely competitive process that unfairly punishes people who went to harder middle schools. Now they’re suggesting we weigh 6th grade scores? It’s ridiculous. Of course we chose a lottery system

Person #1: When you were in 8th grade, didn’t you get a D in math?

Person #2: A c. Please stop personally attacking me

Person #1: Look, I didn’t get into Lowell either

Person #2: We’re the same person

Person #1: ...and even I admit that if I had it together and got in, I would be their proudest alum. You take the smartest people in San Francisco. You eliminate the economic barrier. What do you get? You don’t just get kids who get the highest test scores, you get kids who produce the best plays, win the most debates, perform most competitively in music. And their discipline goes a long way. They also crush everyone else at sports

Person #2: Our mock trial beat theirs, our volleyball team was better, and School of the Arts had the best music. A bunch of people in our year also scored comparably in the SAT and AP exams

Person #1: Great. Good for them. There are precisely eight reasons why your graduating class was taken seriously. One reason was named Happy, one was named Tony, two were named Jon-

Person #2: Stop

Person #1: Lowell is one of the most prestigious high schools in the country. Lowell rewards people who work the hardest and score the best

Person #2: By what? By making it difficult for them to get into good colleges, due to how insanely competitive it is?

Person #1: I’ll call up some Lowell students and ask them how they feel about that statement. No one forces you to go. People who go to Lowell want to go to Lowell, just like people who go to Harvard want to go to Harvard and people who go to West Point know a thing or two about discipline. If you want to coast, don’t go

Person #2: By creating a lottery system, the school board is giving everyone a chance to go to the best high school

Person #1: What makes them the best? This is excluding private schools like Lick...maybe call Lowell the equivalent of UC Berkeley, the best public option. They’re the best because they have the best students. Take that away, and you’re going to just have conformity and a bunch of people who don’t know how to handle the pressure

Person #2: Lowell drains resources. While they were riding high with the best of everything, we were drowning in the sea of nothingness. What we had we had to scrape together, and it’s because Lowell hijacked the smartest people from us

Person #1: Is that what this is about? If anything, your high school had more resources because it had more perceived struggle

Person #2: BS.

Person #1: You got to go to a good college. You got to take the classes you had wanted. What, do you think that was because of your own hard work and discipline?

Person #2: Yes

Person #1: You don’t think it’s because of the calculus teacher who skipped lunch to tutor you before his own quiz, or the computer science teacher who spent a weekend tutoring you, or the free tutor who spent an hour editing your personal statement, then invited you the next day to his office at a publishing house so he could continue to help you after he spent the previous night dreaming about possible improvements to said personal statement?

Person #2: Again, you’re using a personal-

Person #1: I’m using a personal nothing. Lowell High School is a dose of reality, a little shining beacon that can recognize genuine talent and intelligence in all the noise. If you’re smart, you’ll rise. If you’re gifted, you’ll rise. A good education system recognizes the brilliant and the gifted, but in your efforts to promote your Marxist, millennial, everyone-is-a-special-snowflake bullshit, you’re attempting to lower everyone to the lowest common denominator. Want to get in? Prove yourself. Want to get better? Study. If you truly believe that hard work pays off, then your way to prove it is by getting into the best public high school

Person #2: Or winning the lottery

Person #1: What always made the school what it is was the lack of a lottery. No luck. No raffle. There’s a cutoff point set, score enough points off of merit, and you get it. Done. Simple. Is that so difficult that the Board of Education can’t figure it out? The students should be teaching them, not the other way around

[https://www.sfgate.com/education/article/sf-school-lottery-Lowell-High-15663889.php]

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ladyfranfran14 · 8 years ago

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STOP THE STRAND DISCRIMINATION

This senior high (grade 11), I thought my new school was great. Well its actually great but.... the majority students here are not-so-great people(not generalizing everyone here). I thought that I would see mature people yet all I ever see was people who are not commited in their studies. Yet why did I put the title there here's why.. What is strand discrimination? - unjust treatment of the students because of their specialized track when in reality every strand has its equal and unique studies. Here in my country there are different kinds of strands: ©TRIVIA AND FACTS AND EDUKASYON PH© --- Accountancy, Business and Management (ABM) Strand °specialzes in bussiness and acounting. is for those who plan on taking up Economics, Business Administration, Accountancy and Marketing in college. Those who are planning to take up HRM should choose this too. Humanities and Social Sciences Strand (HUMSS) °is for students who are eyeing Writing (particularly, novelists), Political Science, Sociology, Priesthood, Law and Community Studies. If you have a talent in public speaking, this strand is for you. General Academic Strand (GAS) °If you’re not yet sure what course to take in college, this strand is the same as you. It teaches Social Science, Humanities, Economics, Management and Disaster Readiness. Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) °is the perfect track to choose if you are planning to study Pure and Applied Sciences, Engineering and Mathematics in college. You will be studying Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Calculus in this strand. This is not for the faint-hearted. Arts and Design Track.(AD) °This track is for those who are interested in pursuing careers on the performative and creative field. Get to discover your capabilities and stretch what you can do in industries of music, theatre, visual arts, media arts, and dance. You can gain various skills such as song composing, stage performing, illustrating, sculpting, photography, or choreography under this track. Arts and Design also aims not only to ensure that you can get a livelihood out of your interest in arts and design but also to help various regions in the country in preserving their local culture. Sports °This is not all about dance and just playing sports. Physical Education includes an understanding of human movements through anatomy and physiology. Part of the curriculum in the Sports Track is Safety and First Aid. This is to ensure that you have the life skills and competencies in safety, injury prevention and management in various sports and exercise settings for prompt and proper response during emergencies. Part of the career track in here is for you to learn the right ways in administering tests and programs for physical fitness and performance enhancement. Technical-Vocational Livelihood Track (Tech-Voc) °The Tech-Voc track is divided into four strands. This caters to those who want to work immediately after Senior High School a. Home Economics Stand This is our classic idea of the TLE subject. Those who are interested in housekeeping, tailoring, caregiving, food and beverage services, bread and pastry services, tourism and handicrafts should choose this. Take note though that this isn’t the correct strand for those who are planning to take Hotel and Restaurant Management (HRM) in college. Most students who choose this have plans to work in the aforementioned areas immediately after Senior High School. b. Information and Communication Technology Strand Interested in computers? The ICT Strand is the perfect choice. You’ll be taught how to write computer programs, websites and possibly apps. This includes Medical Transcription and Computer Animation. After taking this strand, you can then proceed to BSIT in college. You can also work immediately as a computer programmer, animator or medical transcriptionist but make sure you’ve already learned enough. c. Agri-Fisheries Strand This strand is for those who are interested in agriculture and aquaculture. Horticulture, Pest Management, Animal Production, Slaughtering and Fish Production are all tackled here. Graduates from this strand might be able to work in farms immediately but they can also proceed to related courses in college. d. Industrial Arts Strand The last strand under the Tech-Voc track is our classical idea of what tech-voc is – Carpentry, Automotive Servicing, Refrigeration and Air-conditioning, Electronics Repair, Electrical Installation, Welding (SMAW), Plumbing and Tile Setting. --- As you all read each track specialized certain fields respectively. The treatment though is different and not a good one. I tell you my story. I'm F, 17 years old choosing a track for my future. At first, I do not know which track should I choose cuz you know there's still college. I think first the pros and cons. Pro because it would be convenient especially if I would still choose that related career from my specialized track. Con because it is very expensive though education nowadays is all about money. I choose Arts and Design Track. Well, my parents was kinda dissappointed when I told them the track I chose because out of all things why that track. My father voiced out that 'it would lead you to know where.'I admit it I cried after my father leftvyou know why? That is my DREAM. I WANTED AND NEEDED that track because I may find there who I am. Now I do not regret it because not only that I found myself when I choose Arts and Design but I now have people who I consider as my family (my classmates). We considered ourselves as a family as if we are brothers and sisters. This is the first time in my school years that I have experience to having a united fam.Everyone in my class is equal. There is no fake personalities only we show our true colors to each other. Always having a good time spreading good vibes even if you are stress af. Yet there's a catch... Being united family there are still conflicts not in my class but in the other strands. When you thought everything is good. Someone will kill the joy. I do not when did the conflict/discrimination began.. Maybe is it because some of my subject teachers praised me and my classmates for the good behavoir yet noisy in a good way. Most of me and my classmates are mature becuz we do not want bashing and bullying people because we have conscience. Others maybe are jealous because me and my classmates are one but the are divided. Maybe its a mystery.. Most of my classmates heard the rumours/talks about our class.. Some people asked my classmates why they choose the track and they told my classmates 'You chose it because you suck at MATH and it is very easy track' Another asked and told that "why are you guys participating in specch choir competition, shouldn't you guys be in the decorations?" Really?! Just because we are Arts and Design doesn't mean you should treat us as if we are nothing to you. You treated as if you guys are suprior and ours are minority. When in reality, like life, NOTHING IS EASY. You sould treat us as equals because we are students our OBEJTIVE here is to learn and achieve our dream not having some competion and also tension that would tear us all apart. I hope that whatever problems you all have, you will find solutions for it. ~We have to be united branch not a divided branch!~

#school #life #stopstranddiscrimination #family #stress #rumour #talk #realtalk #imagine #seniorhigh #grade11 #highschool #awareness #journal

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lua-study-blog · 8 years ago

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About us!

A/ Can you introduce yourself?

Helena: I’m Helena, I’m 16 and I live in France around Paris (it’s not romantic as you think!). I’m easily recognizable as someone very messy, and with a...Strong attitude, if I can put it like that. Oh, you can just nickname me “Hel”, it’s the goddess of hell (nordic mythology). Pretty fun.

Jodie: I’m Jodie, same age and I live in Paris in the 12th district. Helena (the most pessimistic one) had said Paris isn’t the city people imagine it to be. I won’t deny it, but Paris still has his own charms that counter all the cons. And no, it’s not “funny” for me when you’re teasing me so hard on the same topic all the time (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻)!

Helena: But you have such a childish face, and you’re super clumsy. Better being bullied by me than someone else!

Jodie: ಠ_ಠ

Jéssica: I’m Jéssica, though I prefer for people to simply call me Jess, I’m 19 and I live in Costa Rica—a really small country in America. I’m your quiet and shy type of person, but I’ll try my best to be active over here! And from the looks of it, seems like I’m going to be calm one here, huh?

B/ What level are you in? What do you aim to become?

Helena: I’m a high school sophomore, sciences section with bio/geology as the option. I want to be an engineer (computer science, big data…)

Jodie: I’m studying at the same school as her, same section and same classroom xD. My dream job would be becoming a teacher for the primary level. I also aim to be vegetarian too!

Jéssica: I’m in my second year of college, currently on the History major. But I want to change to the English major. My aim is to become a translator in the future.

C/ What do you like/hate?

Helena: I’m quite competitive, so I like being a honour student. I’ve been drawing ever since I was 10 y.o, I also love reading, writing, and trying out new apps or softwares...hahaha. I hate sunny days because I just burn (at least my skin does).

Jodie: I’m really polyvalent in term of taste. Still, I have some preferences : I’m fonder of asian cultures more than european ones. I like to read ( books or manga ), less if compared to Helena in terms of books, but still. I love RP (Role-play) whether it’s in real life with friends or in a game, I like watching Korean drama, and animes. Not really athletic but I can ski very well since I’ve been practicing since the age of 6. Lastly, I don’t like wearing socks...Socks are evil.

Jéssica: Just as Helena and Jodie, I’m also really fond of anime and manga myself. I also like to read books, going with novels most of the time, and writing from time to time. I’m more than anything else, I love languages and the cultures of other countries, so yeah, you’re going to see quite a lot of those things coming from me.

D/ What do you plan to do, as a studyblr?

Helena: Share knowledges for education, as it’s one of my ‘thing’ ever since middle school. Review apps, stationery, and trying my best to do nice pictures. To be honest, I don’t think you necessarily need to do pretty notes, and in my school system it would cost too much times. I do love seeing beautiful notes though. Count rather on Jodie and Jess for that :)

Jodie: *putting all the pressure on her fellow* Quite nice hum xD ?

Helena: No one wants to see my notes. NO ONE.

Jodie: You need to be a little more confident x). As a studyblr I think it would be a great accomplishment if I don’t do too much grammar mistakes in english thus avoiding you guys from medical fees for burnt eyes.

Jéssica: So seems like all the pressure falls on me, huh? Sorry guys, it’s kind of impossible to have pretty notes in college. But as a studyblr I want to share some tips on how to survive the magical world of being in college!

E/ Stationery you use?

Helena: Stabilo fineliners, set of muji pens 0.5. Everything else are cheap stuff found in supermarkets.

Jodie: Some muji’s pen and fineliners. I prefer to use a chinese pencil because they slip on the paper better (they are softer) or a mitsubishi uni 0.5 criterium. I use fountain, ballpoint, gel ink pens : I like to change the type of pen I use.

Jéssica: Does a normal blue pen counts? Well, I guess I use a black one too xD Apart from that, highlighters are life, highlighters are love.

F/ One last word ?

Helena: … Studyblrs don’t have any male bloggers. Did we scare them away with our aesthetic thing???

Jodie: A long journey has started…

Jéssica: Bear with us guys...

#studyblr #helena #jodie #jess #fas #about us #introduction #studyquill #intellectus #emmastudies

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fashiontrendin-blog · 7 years ago

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What It’s Like to Be a Female Coder in the Male-Dominated Tech World

http://fashion-trendin.com/what-its-like-to-be-a-female-coder-in-the-male-dominated-tech-world/

What It’s Like to Be a Female Coder in the Male-Dominated Tech World

In partnership with Olay.

The recent conversations around gender disparities in the workforce have focused on a variety of things: pay, mobility, respect. But woven through all of those things is culture. Cultural norms shape professional environments on visible and invisible levels, and shifting that narrative takes time, energy and resistance to the status quo. This is especially true in male- and white-dominated industries, where tradition and legacy still play a huge role in how companies grow and change.

In a four-part series with Olay, Man Repeller will speak with six different women who work in primarily male-dominated fields to learn more about how that change is happening — and what it’s like to be in the middle of it. Below, meet Kirsten Koa, Software Engineer at Niantic, Inc., the software development company behind Pokémon GO.

An Intro to the World of Coding (and Video Games)

I’m a software engineer. Part of my job is writing code, but there are a lot of other aspects, like trying to architect the code that you’re writing. You have to plan ahead on how you want to structure the code before you actually dive in and write it, or else you can just get into a huge mess. There’s also a lot of collaborating with other people across disciplines (product, design, art, marketing, etc.) to figure out what we are going to build and then actually working together to build it.

The main reason I got into coding is because of video games. When I was a kid, I would play video games with my sisters or my cousins, sometimes with my dad. I loved playing Mario Party, Smash Brothers, Pokémon (it’s really cool to be able to work on a video game franchise like Pokémon that I grew up loving). In middle school, I was really into Neopets, which was my first introduction to coding because you could code in HTML and CSS to make your profile look better.

Actually, this is a funny story: I kind of got an intro to coding through Neopets. In high school, I knew you had to code to make video games, but that was basically all I knew about it, so I went to the library and I checked out C++ For Dummies. I had no idea what C++ was except that it was some programming language. I started reading it and was like, Okay, so you write this code to do a loop or something — where do I write it? Then I was like, If I write it in a text document, will the code actually do something? So then I tried writing it in a text document and nothing happened. I was like, “Okay, well obviously there’s more to this that I don’t understand.”

My high school didn’t have AP computer science, so I didn’t really get to try software engineering or coding during high school. But when I applied to colleges, I thought, This is something I want to try again even though I got nowhere with it before, and luckily I ended up falling in love with it in college.

On Discouragement and What Keeps Her Going

I think a lot of women don’t see themselves as software engineers while growing up. I wanted to study computer science or programming because of video games, but I think video games are mostly marketed as a boy thing. I usually play video games with my guy friends and not my female friends. But software engineering and computer science is way more than video games. Now, there’s more visibility into that, so hopefully it’s getting better.

I also think having negative experiences while working could really discourage people from continuing in the field. I used to tutor an Intro to Java class in college, and I had students say to me, “Oh, you actually know what you’re talking about,” or, “Wow, you’re actually really helpful.”

I was really happy to be able to help them, and at the time, I didn’t think anything of it. I was just like, Oh, they’re just surprised that a tutor was able to help them with their problem or something. But looking back, I feel like maybe it’s because they didn’t expect me to actually know what I was talking about as a woman, even though I was hired to be a tutor for that class.

So I’ve had some experiences like that, or with someone else taking credit for something I did (in that particular case, I talked to a manager about it). But those were actually pretty small pieces of my overall experience. I made a lot of friends in my computer science program and we were all taking these classes together, struggling to learn these concepts together. I also had a few friends who were older than me who I met through tutoring — they were upperclassmen when I was a sophomore or freshman. I really looked up to them and they were all really encouraging and inspiring. They were doing internships, working at Google, working at Facebook, doing all these really cool things.

I also have a really good friend, her name is Brina Lee, who was the first female software engineer at Instagram. We went to college together and tutored for the same professor. She’s a few years older than I am, and has been a really great friend and a role model in software engineering — but also, just in general. She encouraged me to apply for the Facebook Grace Hopper Scholarship (Grace Hopper is a conference for women in computing). She encouraged me to apply for the Out in Tech Scholarship, a conference for LGBTQ students. And she’s always available to help me.

On Loving Her Job

I think the thing I love the most about my job right now is being able to build things that make people happy. Right now I’m working on Pokémon Go, which has a lot of passionate players. We just came out with the social and trading features; I was the tech lead on the Pokémon GO side, and implementing these features was a huge cross-functional team effort. We spent a lot of time iterating on what we wanted to build to help players have fun playing with their friends, and also to help them make new friends.

When the feature came out, the reception was so positive and players were so excited that it made me really happy. All the hard work was worth it. There’s a lot more that I want to do to improve the feature, and we’re working on that now, but I think seeing how my work positively affects other people is really the best part.

The Advice That Helped Her Through Her Early College Career

When I started in college as a Computer Science major, I basically only had my Neopets programming experience. During my Intro to Computer Science class, I went to all the lectures and read the book, but then I took my first midterm and I got a C on it. Coming from high school where I was almost a straight-A student, I was like, “Oh my God! This is my major! What am I doing?! How can I get a C? I want to be good at this!”

The professor that I had for my intro classes was really great and always gave awesome advice. One of his first pieces of advice was to make friends with people in the same major and form study groups, so a group of people around me formed a study group together. By the end of the quarter I was able to bring my grade up back to an A.

I had similar experiences with other classes as well; it was a lot of work to learn the material. It was also hard to not feel discouraged because people come into college with different levels of programming experience. I had pretty much zero experience, and some people had already gotten internships or had AP computer science at school. But I decided to do my best.

Another great piece of advice that same teacher gave was to get an internship, to get real world experience — even if you get rejected 500 times because you’re a freshman and you don’t know that much yet. “You have to get rejected,” he said. “You’ll get rejected. But just keep applying, and you never know, maybe someone will say yes to you.” I really took that to heart and applied for all the things.

On the Challenges of Being One of a Few Women in Software Engineering

Most of my experiences have been very positive, and I’ve met a lot of cool and nice people. I’ve worked on many teams where I was the only woman, and usually, it wasn’t really a problem. There were a few instances early on in my career where I heard sexist remarks (like, “I could never have a female manager”), or where I asked for help on a difficult project and it was dismissed as an easy problem, or it was assumed that I was doing something wrong — only to later have that person admit I was right, or that it was hard to solve.

Because of those experiences, I try to be mindful when people ask me questions or need help. I don’t know everything, and I don’t have the answer to everything. Even now that I’ve been out of college for four years, there’s still so much to learn. If someone is asking for help, I try to come at it with an open mind and see if we can solve the problem together.

Those experiences also taught me the importance of looking for a good group of people, a good team, while interviewing. It’s really important to work well with your coworkers, but also, I love when you really like your coworkers, because then it makes going to work fun. You never feel like you need to one-up anyone. It makes work so much better, less stressful and happier.

When I started working full-time at Google, I was placed on a really great team. I was able to learn so much and grow so much as a software engineer because nobody made me feel bad for asking any question. All my teammates would teach me. And I would make sure that if I had a question and somebody helped me with it, I would write down how we solved the problem together so that next time I wouldn’t have to ask the same question. It was a great environment because it was open and collaborative.

Why Having Fun is Her Main Career Goal

In terms of my career, my main goal is to keep having fun and enjoying it. I love my coworkers that I work with and I feel like we can do so much more together if we continue working together. I also love the product and the game that we’re working on. It’s definitely been super fun, and makes me really happy to be able to work here and work on this product.

I want to keep learning new things. I learned a lot the past year and few months I’ve been at Niantic. I want to grow more as an individual and as a software engineer. But I also think that it’s really important for me to enjoy the type of work that I’m doing and to have fun and just be happy. I feel like that’s basically my goal in life, too.

One thing I’ve been thinking about recently is more work/life balance. Everyone I work with is super passionate about what we’re doing, and so sometimes, for me, work/life balance takes a back seat. I’ve been talking to my manager and other people in the company and I think it’s something that could be improved upon. Everybody loves what we’re doing; we’re super passionate, want to make the best features for our users, but work is only a part of life. It’s not all of life. It’s important to be able to balance that with our family or our hobbies or just taking time for ourselves.

Advice for Anyone Looking to Get Into Computer Science

I encourage anyone in high school or college to take a computer science class to see if you like it. There are also a lot of great YouTube videos where people teach how to code or talk about their experience as a software engineer. If you think you might be interested, search “life as a software engineer.” Or if you have a specific thing you want to learn, like how to make an app or a game, search for that. There are tutorials for everything.

When you’re first getting into computer science — or maybe any field — it seems like there’s people who know everything, and you don’t know anything. I’ve heard a lot of people say stuff like, “You’ve got to fake it until you make it,” but honestly, I’m not very good at faking it, so that [didn’t help] me.

When I was just starting, it might have helped me if I had realized that even though people seem like they know everything, and they might actually know a lot, nobody knows everything and there’s so much more to learn. And you shouldn’t feel bad if you don’t know everything about a certain topic. As long as you’re able and willing to learn, you’ll be able to do great things.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Up next in this four part series, meet Abyah Wynn, the vice president of business development at a venture capital firm called Trimantium.

Photographed by Ashley Batz.

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our-beginnings · 8 years ago

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Michael Chase, Senior Software Engineer at Ancestry

Tell us a bit about who you are, and what you do now.

My name is Michael Chase, and I’m currently a Senior Software Engineer at Ancestry. I serve as a full stack engineer (across both front and back end) and architect for my team at Ancestry. I’m also an active member of DevColor, a contributor to the Sequel app project, and a crypto-currency trader.

What do you get up to day-to-day at Ancestry? What’s one of your favourite things about working there?

My day-to-day at Ancestry usually starts off with me making my famed breakfast of plain oatmeal with a cut-up apple and cinnamon. I catch up on emails and Slack, and try to write any last minute code (usually Javascript or Node) before the daily standup. After that, we might have a technical discussion or some other meetings, and I then spend an hour or two working before lunch. Currently, we’re working on a survey project to collect phenotypic data (that is, observable characteristics/traits). After lunch, more meetings and writing code.

One of my favourite things about Ancestry is the people. I consider myself very lucky to be on such a great team with talented engineers and a great manager.

Is this where you expected to find yourself when you were a kid in Maryland? If not, where did you think you’d be?

I have memories of being a kid and wanting to work on spaceships: rockets specifically. I thought I would major in “aerospace engineering.” At some point I also thought it would be cool to be a tradesman doing plumbing, electrical, and carpentry type of work.

I took to computers at an early age. In the late 90s and very early 2000s, me and my brother were always tied to my grandmother’s computer. However, I had no idea I would (or could really) work with computers until my high school guidance counselor recommended I take a vocational IT class. There, we learned PC basics, including how to take them apart. That made me think I wanted to work on hardware in some way, and in the years leading up to graduation, I thought I would most likely be a computer repairman.

back then I thought I would hate sitting and staring at a computer all day, “typing.”

After deciding to go to college, that transitioned to this idea of making microchips and circuits (we had learned basic wiring and circuitry in the class). When I did get to college, I took up the “engineering” track of the Computer Science program, and it was that which led me to software development. Ironically, back then I thought I would hate sitting and staring at a computer all day, “typing.” But now, I absolutely love it.

What were the ‘eureka’ moment (or moments) that sparked your journey?

My journey to being a developer started a bit later than some. The first time I ever wrote code was in college!

In all honesty, life just kind of fell together in a lot of ways. In high school when I wanted to be a “tradesman” and didn’t want to go to college, I had a teacher named Ms. Nolan that would tell me (and the rest of the class) “you’re not dreaming big enough” and “you’re going to college and you’re going for free.” I thought she was absolutely crazy.

One day, my guidance counselor told me there was a free spot on a college tour, so I went. The colleges I visited were the only ones I applied to. This is also where I got introduced to my scholarship program - DNIMAS. That was a eureka moment of sorts: Norfolk State University didn’t have a Computer Engineering degree, which was what I’d originally hoped to do. But I wasn’t about to pass up a full ride, so I enrolled as a Computer Science major on the engineering track.

As luck would have it, I thoroughly enjoyed coding and was exceedingly good at it. I remember one day during my first semester: we had just started to really learn to code, and I went back to my dorm room after classes and just began playing with C++ using Dev C++. The more I understood what my code was doing, the more I wanted to write and learn. I was hooked!

This passion got me into some pretty good internships at the Department of Commerce, JP Morgan Chase and IBM. In the end, I took a job from IBM, but I was assigned the most boring role one could ever do: Sharepoint Administration.

The more I understood what my code was doing, the more I wanted to write and learn.

My biggest eureka moment occurred while I was at IBM, when a Google recruiter reached out to me on LinkedIn and I ended up interviewing there.

It was a total culture shock. The type of things I needed to know for college, DoC, JP, and IBM were worlds away from Silicon Valley. I would compare it to working as a car salesman, then one day stumbling into the car factory assembly line and being expected to know exactly how to put the cars together from scratch. I didn’t get that job at Google, but I learned that there was this whole other side of technology out there and I had to be a part of it.

From that moment, what path did your career take?

I went from thinking “Oh, I have a decent job. If I stay here 5 years, I’ll get promoted” at IBM to thinking, “I need to learn how to be a true coder, how to solve the world’s problems and make the sharepoints, not manage them.”

The first step was to find a job in the Bay area. I applied to a lot of places and didn��t really get much. I ended up falling back to plan Z: switching from IBM to Accenture. It was hilarious, because one of my interviewers even said, “so this is just a business card change for you.” But I moved to the Bay Area with my then girlfriend (now fiancée) and joined Accenture’s SF office, then set out to find a real coding job.

“I need to learn how to be a true coder, how to solve the world’s problems and make the sharepoints, not manage them.”

It was a huge leap of faith. I wasn’t very skilled at the time so I was relatively underpaid, supporting both of us while my fiancée got her Masters degree in Counseling Psychology. Accenture had a wide reach of clients it served and projects one could be placed on and as luck would have it, my Sharepoint hacks done in HTML/CSS/Javascript positioned me to get me contracted on an Apple project (which I actually had to fight for, but that’s another story). Working there as an Accenture contractor isn’t quite the same as working there as an employee, but I still learned a ton. That knowledge allowed me to get into a startup called Yo, which is where I picked up almost all of my backend experience. When that ride ended, I came to Ancestry.

Was there a person, course, or other resource that really helped you along the way? Was your family supportive?

Practice was really my best friend. A lot of what I learned, I taught myself— by trying things and practicing. I have always been curious about how things work. As a small child I would take apart my toys (although they rarely got put back together). Everyone around me was very supportive; most of my teachers (both in high school and in college) saw the potential in me and would do what they could to push me to be as good as I could be.

My family was supportive as well. It was a win-win for them: as I got better and older I became the family tech support guy! All that being said, my biggest resource was probably my scholarship program. I can’t imagine my mom would have been able to afford to send me to college on her own. So without DNIMAS there is a good chance I would have ended up going to community college. I’m sure I still would have made it, but it’s hard to say how much more time it would have taken me.

It was a win-win for [my family]: as I got better and older I became the family tech support guy!

There seems to be a certain pressure on underrepresented folks in this industry to change it from within (while not always being empowered to do so). How do you deal with this?

I feel this pressure as well. I started out by doing things like speaking at my church, going back to NSU and my high school to talk, and tutoring and offering advice to peers and students. I think what I do best (for better or worst) is speaking up about things very loudly. As my fiancé would word it, I “speak [my] truth even if [my] voice shakes.”[1] At work, I’m very outspoken. I’ve developed the type of reputation where people ask me for my opinion when I’m quiet, both because they value it and because it’s unusual for me to not have one.

The hardest part, though, is being consistent and resilient. There are days when I absolutely am ready to quit my job because of the needed change and lack of diversity. However, I always tell myself that if I leave, who will be there to make this change? So I press on and I go to therapy!

[1]Maggie Kuhn

If you could do everything all over again, do you think your journey would be the same? Would you want it to be?

If I could do it all over again, I would probably study harder and try and get directly into a “big name” place like Google. When I first graduated, somehow I just had no idea this world existed, so I would try and do more to get to where I am now faster.

There is, though, a decent chance my journey would have been the same. Because of how life works, I wouldn’t actually want it to be different because of the ripple effects. But speaking in isolation, I definitely wish I could have gotten up to speed faster and thus progressed in my knowledge even more.

Is there anything about the internet or technology that you remember from your childhood/early years that makes you feel nostalgic?

Napster comes to mind. Me, my brother, and another friend of mine use to be really into downloading “stuff.” We didn’t have internet ourselves so we had to perfectly position our computer by the window to “borrow” the neighbor's wifi. Those were the days.

How do you see your next five to ten years? What are you most excited about? Perhaps most afraid of?

In five to ten years, I hope that I’ll look back and think, “man what was I thinking.” I’m all about exponential growth. I flip perspectives very quickly and the goals I have today will likely not be the same in a year.

That being said, ideally I’ll be working on a cause, and less about making money. One of the things I’ve truly come to dislike is capitalism. Most of us work and make money for the sake of survival. I believe that it’s rare to find someone who works where they do solely because of the pure joy they get out of it. Don’t get me wrong, I love writing code, and I do fun stuff at Ancestry— but if I won the lottery, I’d quit that day. But wouldn’t everybody?

The thing that excites me the most right now is crypto-currency and the overall prospect of being able to run my own business - or at least be my own boss. Whether that’s being the CTO of Ancestry, CTO at Sequel, running a Cryptocurrency trading related business, or just having a bot that trades for me while I sit on the beach— I’m not sure.

Thanks so much to Michael for his time and excellent responses! You can find him on LinkedIn.

Also thanks to /dev/color and their speaker form, which has connected me to both Michael and Nick!

[1]Maggie Kuhn

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lewiskdavid90 · 9 years ago

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95% off #Learn to Code by Making Games – The Complete Unity Developer – $10

Game development & design made fun. Learn C# using Unity 4.6 & Unity 5. Your first 7 2D & 3D games for web & mobile.

All Levels, – 52 hours, 303 lectures

Average rating 4.6/5 (4.6 (15,688 ratings) Instead of using a simple lifetime average, Udemy calculates a course’s star rating by considering a number of different factors such as the number of ratings, the age of ratings, and the likelihood of fraudulent ratings.)

Course requirements:

Mac or PC capable of running Unity 3D. A copy of Unity 4.6.3 for early content, free from Unity. A copy of Unity 5 for later content, also free. A copy of Blender, free from www.Blender.org Either some experience of coding, or the will to do self-study.

Course description:

The course is continually updated, a major improvement was made in Glitch Garden in March 2016, and over 30 new quiz questions were added in June 2016.

This is the online game development school that was a runaway success on Kickstarter. As a result there are English closed-captions throughout.

Learn how to create video games using Unity 3D, the free-to-use game development tool. We start super simple so you need no prior experience or Unity of coding! With our online tutorials, you’ll be amazed what you can achieve.

Benefit from our world-class support from both other students, and Ben is on the forums regularly. Go on to build several games including a full 3D version of Pong with an online multiplayer scoreboard, and more.

You will have access to a course forum where you can discuss topics on a course-wide basis, or down to the individual video. Our thriving discussion forum will help you learn and share ideas with other students. Check out our reviews to see how people love this feature.

Unity 5: The first part of the course is taught in Unity 4. 6, as this is well established and stable. When you get to Bowlmaster we upgrade to Unity 5, and start using it’s great new features. You can use Unity 5 from the start if you wish, with only minor code differences.

The course is project-based, so you will not just be learning dry programming concepts, but applying them immediately to real indie games as you go. All the project files will be included, as well as additional references and resources – you’ll never get stuck. There are talking-head videos, powerful diagrams, quality screencasts and more.

Oh, and it’s just bigger and better than the competition. See the length and the reviews.

For each demo game you build you will follow this process…

Be challenged to build the entire game yourself. Be shown step-by step how to build it. Be challenged to apply, and re-apply your knowledge regularly.

You will get full lifetime access for a single one-off fee. The creators are qualified and experienced coders and avid gamers, so are able to explain complex concepts clearly, as well as entertain along the way. Most courses teach scripting using only C#.

You will learn C#, including Test Driven Development, a highly valuable skill. By the end of the course you’ll be very confident in the basics of coding and game development, and hungry to learn more.

What this course DOESN’T cover…

Whereas this course is already huge, we can’t possibly cover everything in that time. Here are some things we will not be covering…

Performance optimization. Editor plugins or modifications. Physics engine modification*

* Separate mini-course to cover these this now available.

Anyone who wants to learn to create games: Unity 3D is a fantastic platform which enables you to make production-quality games. Furthermore these games can be created for Windows, MacOS, iOS (even iOS 9), Android and Web from a single source!

If you’re a complete beginner, we’ll teach you all the coding and game design principles you’ll need. If you’re an artist, we’ll teach you to bring your assets to life. If you’re a coder, we’ll teach you game design principles.

Note: access to this course comes with an optional, free community site where you can share games and 3D models, as well as connect with other students.

Dive in now, you won’t be disappointed!

Full details Learn C#, a powerful modern language. Develop a positive attitude to problem solving. Gain an excellent general knowledge of game creation. Learn how object oriented programming works in practice. Transfer your knowledge to .NET, other languages, and more.

Full details Competent and confident with using a computer. Artists who want to learn to bring their assets into games. Some programming experience helpful, but not required. Complete beginners who are willing to work hard. Developers who want to re-skill across to game development.

Full

Reviews:

“Thorough, well laid out and easy to follow. This offers a wealth of information on Unity, C#, game development techniques and other related tools. Plus its pretty easy to gear your game toward any platform (iOS, Android, web, etc.). All without overwhelming me as I can come back to any area and move at my own pace. I would note it’s important to use the Unity version stated, unless you have some experience in this, as I began using a more recent version about halfway through the course and it does require me to convert some of the original course code (I’m not through the last course sections so it’s possible those are using a newer version, not sure yet). Regardless of version changes this is worth it for how much is covered and by the end you should know enough that a new version of Unity/converting some code will not be too difficult. Side note: I got my 16 yr old to follow along for portions covering games he found interesting…great opportunity to learn coding in a fun way. Although I was able to help him through problems before getting stuck too long and giving up. (As most teens are not patient!)” (Polly)

“Course is awesome under any point of view, it leaves out some more advanced and fundamental concepts like multiplayer and networking though. It’s totally worth it anyway especially if you are a beginner, and also pretty useful for intermediate students as well. I am at a pretty advanced level and I just wanted to get a grasp of unity which I had never used before and I gotta say that this was awesome for learning how to master it. Only negative point is that the course should go more in depth on advanced stuff because I believe people will be capable of getting stuff like networking towards the end of this, it’s overall good though.” (Daniel Grieco)

“Thanks for awesome course! I found this course really engaging, it even encouraged me to go and get my Computer Science degree! The course starts with basics of C# and unity, from really simple projects (at first they were too trivial to me, but only then I have realised that they just cement the basics of C#’s language), and then throws at you some chunky other projects which teach you various aspects of Unity and C#. What i felt in the end was a slight regret that we did not cover everything Unity Engine has to offer, but that is for us to explore and probably even monetize! Knowledge gained here totally has usage in for example Unreal Engine. When you combine it with other courses you get extreme flexibility in terms of creating your totally own games! TL;DR: This course is meant for all begginers and game-maker wannabee’s like me and probably a lot of other people! Thanks again guys and keep on with the good work! Jakub” (Jakub Duchniewicz)

About Instructor:

Ben Tristem Sam Pattuzzi

Hi, I’m Ben. I have a degree in computing from Imperial College London, and a physics diploma from the Open University. I started working for myself at the age of 15, and never looked back. I explored careers as varied as being a commercial pilot, stunt-man, rock climbing instructor, and more. None of these provided a continued challenge, and stable income in the same way technology does. After building and selling a home computer support business, I became an angel investor and business mentor here in Cambridge UK. I fell in love with teaching game development through one of my investments, and I now spend all of my time sharing my passion with people like you. I can’t wait to help you experience the fulfilment, and financial freedom, that having a deep understanding of technology brings. So why not start learning to make games with me and my team now? See you soon! Ben

I wrote my first game when I was 14 and ever since, programming has been a key part of both work and play in my life. I studied Computer Science at the University of Cambridge where I still teach undergraduates. When I’m not teaching, I’m a freelance software engineer and enjoy my work with tech start-ups and social businesses. For me, Udemy is the opportunity to combine my passions for teaching and programming.

Instructor Other Courses:

Automate Blender with Python – Give Yourself Superpowers Ben Tristem, Best-selling Instructor, Game Developer, Online Entrepreneur (36) $10 $95 Pass the Unity Certified Developer Exam – Lifetime Access Ben Tristem, Best-selling Instructor, Game Developer, Online Entrepreneur (439) $10 $195 How To Get A Job In The Video Game Industry The Unreal Engine Developer Course – Learn C++ & Make Games Pass the Unity Certified Developer Exam – Lifetime Access Make VR Games in Unity with C# – Cardboard, Gear VR, Oculus …………………………………………………………… Ben Tristem Sam Pattuzzi coupons Development course coupon Udemy Development course coupon Game Development course coupon Udemy Game Development course coupon Learn to Code by Making Games – The Complete Unity Developer Learn to Code by Making Games – The Complete Unity Developer course coupon Learn to Code by Making Games – The Complete Unity Developer coupon coupons

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